


between sun and soil

by ceraunos



Series: sanctum [3]
Category: Black Sails
Genre: Bottom Captain Flint, Canon Compliant, Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Season/Series 04, mute flint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-04
Updated: 2018-09-04
Packaged: 2019-07-07 00:11:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15896961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ceraunos/pseuds/ceraunos
Summary: “Would you like me to tell you about him?” Thomas asks, tracing gentle patterns on James’ shoulders, dancing among freckles.~James Flint was a nightmare, McGraw a fairytale.Set directly after 4.10.





	between sun and soil

_Go on until you reach a people who know nothing of the sea… then plant your bladed oar firmly in the earth._

_\- Book XI, The Odyssey._

 They put metal on his wrists and he wants to tell them he isn’t going anywhere. He can’t move his body to fight if he tried. His mouth is as silent as midnight in the doldrums. His mind is as loud as the screaming of the men whose memories he carries.

 

When Thomas says his name, breathed like a prayer again and again, it sounds foreign against his ear. It belongs to a man he does not know anymore. He braces his body against the shattering feeling that sweeps through it and closes his fists around Thomas' shirt. 

 

“James” someone says and it takes a moment to understand that they mean him. He exists in a plane outside his body, on the edge of consciousness half aware that this is not a hallucination, despite the way the soil wavers under the sun. Mirages of water appear on the horizon, calling back the man who was James Flint.

 

In a bed too big and too still he closes his eyes and sees ghosts.

 

He wakes on the edge of a feeling, breathless. A leg, not his, is warm through the twisted sheets. Someone is breathing on his stomach. He twists his fingers through straw hair, blonder and coarser than it is in his dreams. He sleeps and this time he does not dream.

 

When he wakes again the sound of men at work outside the door is familiar in a way that makes him yearn for everything he’s lost. Thomas is dressed, watching him from the end of the bed.

 

“Good morning. Would you like some tea?” he says. It sounds like the breaking of a wave.

 

The teacup has a chip on one side and no saucer which he is thankful for because it looks too small and fragile in his hands. He doesn’t think about what those hands have done, doesn’t need to; the knowledge flows untapped and unwanted. Tea spills over the edge of the cup. Thomas steadies shaking fingers with his own and sets the cup on the floor.

 

After all this time, there isn’t a hint of shame in Thomas’ kiss and James wants to weep because the only thing left in his bones is shame.

 

“You still taste like the sea.” Thomas murmurs into James’ lips. When he pulls away James’ eyes are wide and wet and there is salt on his lips. “Oh.” Thomas breaths and James gasps and gasps like a drowning man. Thomas’ arms are thicker and firmer than James remembers and they hold him like an iron frame, keeping him from sinking.

 

“Would you like me to tell you about him?” Thomas asks, tracing gentle patterns on James’ shoulders, dancing among freckles. James doesn’t think he has room in his mind for anymore stories, anymore names, anymore lives. He still can’t find his voice, though, and before he can summon it Thomas begins to speak.

 

“He was the most wonderful man I ever met. I loved him without measure.” As Thomas speaks, revering this stranger, James feels a fury the colour of bruises and dry blood well inside his throat. He wants to throw something, hurt something but can’t move under Thomas’ fingertips. Thomas continues to talk, amongst the adoration throwing out birth dates, navel rankings and second hand stories that some distant part of James remembers and he can’t understand why. And then he looks up and sees Thomas, a smile at the corner of his lips and hope in his eyes and the the fog clears. Thomas is telling the tale of James McGraw and James doesn’t have to make room for another story, because he’s heard this one before, once.

 

Thomas sees the recognition dawn in James’ eyes, but doesn’t stop talking, even as James’s hands find his skin. Thomas’ shirt billows as it falls, a sail unfurling, but James doesn’t notice. Amongst everything else, the smell of sweat and skin hasn’t changed and when Thomas sighs under James’ touch they could be back in London, a cool breeze at the window and breakfast waiting downstairs. James’ body remembers the feel of Thomas mouth, of his fingers coaxing him open and he surrenders willingly, even if his mind still wants to resist the touch.

 

Someday soon the tale of James Flint must also be recounted, James knows this. James’ thoughts stray momentarily to Odysseus and his oar, to Eleanor Guthrie, to Madi, to John and everything that their spectral memories bring with them. Then Thomas rocks into him, chanting his name and the room goes white. When James opens his eyes again Thomas is watching him transfixed, like a blind man healed and James doesn’t know what sins he’s unknowingly repented to deserve this. He hopes Thomas knows that when he kisses him it means ‘I love you I love you I love you’. Here, between sun and soil, the sea recedes beyond the horizon and a shadow of peace washes over a man who is called James.

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: I’ve adapted the opening quote from two different translations of the Odyssey. E.V. Rieu’s version calls it a ‘shapely’ oar, which seems weirdly sexual for an oar, while Fagels translation names it as a ‘well-planed’ oar but later in the passage describes it as being a ‘bladed, balanced oar’.
> 
> I can't believe it's been 3 years since I've posted any of my writing (ironic since I've spent 3 years doing nothing but writing). This was just a quick thing to get a grip on characters before I start to write a bigger fic but maybe this will become chaptered/ a series as well.


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